Darwinism’s Stranglehold on the Christian Mind

"At what chapter in the book of Genesis does the Bible begin to be true?"

This is a question we find ourselves repeating more and more often as we participate in discussions on Facebook and other social media websites. Obviously, we're not asking atheists this question; after all, they don't believe the Bible is true at any point. We are asking this question to Christians of various denominations who attack us for our belief in a literal six-day creation and the global flood of Noah's time.

Many of these people appear to have a high regard for the Bible, sprinkling Bible verses into their online postings. They even seem to accept the miracles recorded in the pages of Scripture - especially the miracles recorded in the New Testament. But when it comes to the creation account given in the first chapters of the Bible - and the worldwide flood just a few chapters later - they wriggle and squirm and try to explain it away.

Such is the deadly stranglehold of Darwinism on the modern mind - even on the minds of Christians. Many people have been so indoctrinated with evolutionary dogma all their lives, they have a difficult time discarding it after they become Christians. Sadly, some of them end up as "theistic evolutionists" - believing that God created through the means of evolution.

On the positive side, however, some of these people are able to accept as true the early chapters of Genesis when they are shown the inconsistency of their position. So the next time you run into one of these people - either online, in the workplace or even in your church - challenge them to think about their position. Ask the question at the beginning of this blog posting or this one: "If you don't believe what the Bible says about how we got here, how can you believe what it says about where we're going?"

Comments

If I answer "The book of Genesis becomes true at chapter 1 verse 1" I have no direct obligation to accept "a literal six-day creation and the global flood of Noah’s time" as this post seems to imply.

Take an example from the other end of the Bible. I believe Revelation to be true, but I have no direct obligation to believe that I will see a literal seven-headed, ten-horned, bear-footed, lion-mouthed chimera of an animal rising out of the sea (the beast, Rev 13:1-2). Nor should I suit up in knightly armor because I expect to see the beast's companion as a literal dragon.

The discussion is too in-depth and complex for a blog entry, so I'm not going to argue the point exhaustively. I do appreciate the fact that apocalypse is a very different genre than theological history, but the same observation applies to both: the genre of the writing is key to how the truth is communicated, and what kinds of truth are addressed. God the Creator gave human writers very great powers of creation when it comes to writing.

As Creationists (six-day, progressive, or whatever brand we fall in), we need to be just as careful with our interpretation of Scripture as we are with our interpretation of the observed facts of Science.

The observed facts of the fossil record and intra-species Natural Selection are not proof of evolution. They are empirical observations, and no more. Evolution is the theory built around them - and that theory stands or falls based on its consistency with those facts.

Creationists can also build a theory around the same facts. Even without bringing Genesis into the picture. Playing on a 'level' field, we can postulate an Intelligent Designer just as rightfully as Evolutionists can postulate an unknown mechanism for cross-species mutation and addition of genetic material.

The real issue is NOT a scientific issue; it is a spiritual issue. Darwinism has a stranglehold on many Christians because they don't understand the difference between fact and theory. In my opinion, this is really part of a much wider 'darkening of our minds" that causes us to fall prey to more error than just bad Science.

Ironically, when it comes to the Bible, Creationists are likely to fall prey to the same error as those who fall to Evolution. We don't understand the difference between the 'fact'--the textual record itself--and our interpretation of it. Nor between our interpretation and what God, as Holy Spirit, actually communicates.

We believe God's Word to be inerrant, for instance...and somehow miss the fact that the 'Word of God is Living and Active' and that we, and our interpretive abilities, are NOT the final arbiters of Truth.

In other words, the Revealed Truth is not 'IN' the text...any more than the 'Truth' of Evolution is 'IN' the facts of the fossil record.

We read the Bible and interpret the textual record we read. Our interpretation is not the Truth; the TRUTH is the inerrant Word that God speaks through the text as we read & interpret it.

We can read about six days of Creation and interpret it as six literal days. Perhaps that IS part of the TRUTH that God speaks through the text. Perhaps it is not. Creationists don't all agree on that point.

The REAL problem, and the really asphyxiating part of Darwinism's stranglehold, is that the OBVIOUS TRUTH that God speaks through the text is that he INTENTIONALLY CREATED with PURPOSE.

However you 'spin' the genre of Genesis, and whatever hermeneutic circle you dance around in, I don't see how you can get around this point. The text clearly communicates this, no matter how you read it.

And if you really do believe that God reveals his inerrant Word through the text of the Bible, then belief in Evolution is OUT OF THE QUESTION.

Evolution is unintentional. 'Creatures' (ironic term, isn't it?) are CHANCE results of a plethora of purposeless events. It requires NO involvement of God, or any kind of Intelligent being anywhere close to the God we know. This kind of claim about the Universe, and Humanity, is TOTALLY OPPOSITE of the obvious message of Genesis.

We're not in danger because we don't believe in six-day Creationism; we're in danger because we choose to disbelieve even the most obvious Word from God. THAT clearly shows how much of a stranglehold we're in...the stranglehold of a force much more sinister than puny Darwinism.

Submitted by Gary (not verified) on Tue, 2009-07-07 12:08.

I strongly recommend The Genesis Record by Henry Morris. I hope that Ron will read it.

I decided the whole Bible was all true in the manner it is written after learning piecemeal confirmations of individual portions of it. I started reading it through as an agnostic teenage member of a church-going, rather lukewarm family. In the words I heard Walter Martin use when asked on the radio if he really takes the Bible literally, I "take the Bible seriously." To decide whether a passage is intended to be believed as history, I consider how it is written, what kind of test it is connected to, how that connection is made and what the rest of the Bible says about it.

Compare Genesis and Revelation again. The Genesis stories link chain-like in a fairly simple historical progression from an initial non-industrial created pair to report many social and technological developments over many centuries, without any suggestion anywhere in the Bible that it was allegorical. Some fragmentation is there, as would naturally happen when historians have new information to preserve whose connection to the ongoing thread is not real clear or is tenuous. In allegory such asides typically are made to have a clear spiritualization. No such thing occurs in Genesis. The reader is clearly intended to believe it as history.

Revelation begins with a declaration of where the writer was when he experienced what he recorded. He may have felt he was physically receiving the impressions from real happenings through eyes, ears, nose, and skin, or had sensations simply delivered to his mind in a seemingly concrete manner while his body stood overcome by the input. God is capable of producing all those scenes and events, whether physical or virtual input to John's mind. The creation, in real matter, of all of it just for John's learning, or its real prior existence in heaven, or the simple manufacturing of the impressions in John's head, or a combination of those, could be the reality of the experience. In any case, most of the impressions are clearly described either as having a spiritual connection to some reality on earth, (Lampstand to a church) or as allegorically being something else (a city, kings, hills). Overall, it is given to John as a representation of realities of history, of his present time, and of the future. Some impressions may have been as close to the natural physical facts as human senses could report, but throughout Revelation the clear message is that allegory, simile, and representative relations are used to express what John is to say. What he describes seeing we need not doubt that he saw. The way that individual passages happened (or will play out) in our created realm is not presented as simple photographic history.

Thus, while the interpretation of Revelation logically must identify subjects presented in one way but experienced very differently on earth, Genesis' intent is plainly to be understood primarily as direct history.

The events of Genesis 1 through 11 are remarkable, But the main character, God, is a fully sufficient cause, and a credible witness.

If you read the entire Bible, both the Old Testament and New Testament, you will find that the accounts agree that the earth's physical age after the Fall cannot be much more than 6,000 years.

In support of evolution, I've heard a weird theory that Adam and Eve were in the Garden before the Fall for millions of years, while the dinosaurs roamed the rest of the earth, but I'm not buying it. It doesn't agree with scripture, which states the earth was made for man and dominion over it was given to Adam, not to oversized lizards with big teeth.